"First lesson," Li Jian said calmly. "Footwork comes before strike. Please watch closely, My Lord!"
Before Ash could reply, the captain leapt forward—either recklessly or too slow to judge the situation. He charged by raising his sword high.
In one fluid motion, Li Jian sidestepped as he rotated on his right foot so his back brushed past the sword. As the man overcommitted, Li Jian swiftly unsheathed his sword and made a clean diagonal slash.
Swissh!
The guard's body split in a perfect diagonal cut. He staggered once, then collapsed to the ground.
[Ding! Li Jian has killed a low-level Diamond Rank.]
[Ding! Congratulations to the host for obtaining 1.000 silver points]
Li Jian's foot slid lightly, and he was already back in stance with his sword pointed down.
This time, Ash was quite surprised, as somehow he didn't feel disgusted when he watched the guard's body being sliced in two. He probably guessed that maybe all of those feelings were washed away when he killed someone for the first time.
Not only that, he even felt amazed at how skillful Li Jian was, much better than what he had imagined while reading novels.
Even the comics with the best art still paled in comparison to Li Jian's move just now. Maybe it was mainly because he was watching it with his own eyes.
Although he had seen Li Jian kill two people before, Ash couldn't follow Li Jian's movement as it was so extremely fast that he couldn't even see anything clearly.
"How dare you! Don't you know this is the Heiyu family residence?!" A bulky middle-aged man appeared and shouted angrily as he released his aura, showing his Peak-level Nobility Rank (Rank 7).
"The playtime is over, you can teach him privately later on." Aetherion chuckled.
Li Jian nodded in agreement since if he were to fight against someone of Nobility Rank, Ash wouldn't be able to see and learn anything anyway.
"Hey! Didn't you hear me?" The bulky man shouted in rage, veins could be seen across his face.
"Huuuahhh." Ash yawned, covering his mouth loosely with one hand.
"Gooshh, you talk too much." Ash sneered mockingly. "Of course we know about it, and that's exactly why we're here."
"Commander, they attacked as soon as we confirmed this was the Heiyu estate." One of the guards who held the black token informed the bulky man with a slight bow.
"Good, good, good!" The bulky man nodded aggressively, then unsheathed his sword and gritted his teeth. "Remember to not offend someone you couldn't afford in your next life."
As he said that, he enveloped his sword with a violent fire energy and swung it, releasing a crescent of crimson red energy toward Li Jian at a fast speed.
Looking at the incoming attack, Li Jian didn't block it as he immediately disappeared from the spot and reappeared a few meters to the right.
When he reappeared, he looked at Aetherion with a faint smile.
"What a childish stunt." Aetherion shook his head helplessly, then snorted when the fire attack was 5 meters away from him, since he just happened to be in the line with Li Jian.
"Hmmph!"
Two spatial cracks immediately appeared in front of Aetherion and Li Jian.
The moment the attack entered the spatial crack in front of Aetherion, it immediately came out of the spatial crack at Li Jian's side.
Li Jian enveloped his left hand with a thin, light energy and slapped the fire attack, dispersing it right away as if it was nothing.
'What the fuck are they doing in this situation?' Ash knitted his eyebrows slightly and thought to himself when he saw it.
Unlike Ash, who was a little bit confused about what they were doing, the bulky man's body instantly shuddered uncontrollably when he looked at the scene between Aetherion and Li Jian.
"This…" The bulky man stuttered nervously as he realized that Aetherion and Li Jian were extremely strong, beyond his expectation.
He knew that they should be stronger than him since he couldn't detect their ranks, but he had only guessed that they were probably at Lord Rank.
However, the moment Li Jian dispersed his attack casually, he knew that he was fucked because not even someone who had reached Grandlord Rank could do that.
Let alone the fact that there was another one who had the power of space and seemed to have reached a high level, he won't even be able to escape from his grasp even if they were at the same rank.
"Just finish it quickly. What the hell are you doing with such a cheap prank?!" Aetherion smirked.
Li Jian only smiled in response before vanishing into thin air and reappearing behind the four guards, smiling calmly as he looked at the bulky man a few meters away from him.
A second later, four heads flew in the air with different expressions frozen on their faces.
"Sir—"
Before the bulky man could finish his sentence, Li Jian had already slashed his sword vertically, releasing a crescent of light energy at the bulky man and splitting his body into two.
After the crescent light energy split the bulky man's body, it instantly dispersed on its own.
[Ding! Li Jian has killed a Peak-level Nobility Rank.]
[Ding! Congratulations to the host for obtaining 1 million silver points]
[Ding! Li Jian has killed four people at Platinum Ranks.]
[Ding! Congratulations to the host for obtaining 360 silver points]
A moment later, a few people appeared together at the same time and glanced at the bulky man's body for a split second before looking at Li Jian in terror.
"Sir, is there any misunderstanding between you and him or even our family?" An old man with long white hair and a beard asked politely, bowing his head deeply toward Li Jian.
"No." Li Jian shook his head calmly, then asked. "Do you have any last words?"
"Sir, do you know that the Clear Spring Holy Land is our backer?" The old man spoke with a heavy tone, as if trying to terrify Li Jian.
"Not a bad choice…" Li Jian nodded his head a few times with a smirk and disappeared instantly.
When he reappeared behind them, Li Jian slashed his sword to the side, cleaning the blood from the blade, then grinned as he continued. "For your last words, that is."
— — —
—> Ranks in A/N below :))